著者

村松 怜

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.61, no.2, pp.35-51, 2019-01-30 (Released:2021-01-30)

参考文献数

60

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This article studies the Ministry of Finance’s philosophy on income taxes in Meiji and Taisho Japan. The contribution of this article is twofold. First, it reexamines “tax reform as social policy” in Taisho Japan. Second, it reveals aspects of the Ministry’s taxation philosophy that lasted until the postwar period. Previous research on Taisho‒era tax reforms has focused on the relationship between the tax reforms and “social policy.” The tax reform of 1920, considered a major example of “tax reform as social policy,” has received particular attention: its inclusion of dividends in taxable income in particular is attributed to the taxation and social policy theories of the Japan Association for Social Policy Studies.In contrast with the previous studies, this work reveals other factors leading to the 1920 tax reform by following MOF discussions of income tax going back to the Meiji period. First, the general principle of taxing dividend income did not arise out of a “social policy” context but was consistent with the income tax system envisioned by the MOF since Meiji. The MOF consistently supported a general income tax levied on aggregate income as well as differentiation of the income tax such that earned income would be taxed more lightly than unearned (capital) income. Second, for the MOF, the emergence of the “social policy” debate simply represented a “good opportunity” to bring about the general taxation of dividend income. The chief of the MOF’s National Tax Section of the Tax Bureau, KATSU Masanori, who played an important role in the 1920 income tax reform, regarded general taxation of dividend income as essential for a fair tax system. He took advantage of the “social policy” debate to propose the income tax reform. In the 1930s the MOF proposed the so‒called Baba Tax Reform Plan, which attempted a comprehensive general income taxation. The Tax Bureau, moreover, regarded the comprehensive system of income tax recommended by the Shoup Mission during the postwar US occupation of Japan as the “ideal” tax system. MOF consistently embraced this tax philosophy from Meiji into the postwar period.

著者

高嶋 修一

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.54, no.3, pp.68-70, 2012

著者

古内 博行

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.45, no.2, pp.53-55, 2003

著者

橋谷 弘

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.57, no.1, pp.67-69, 2014

著者

三浦 有史

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.57, no.3, pp.31-41, 2015-04-30 (Released:2017-08-30)

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China has played a key role in creating a "middle class" in developing economics. This does not, however, mean domestic demand-led economic growth by an emerging "middle class". Intolerance to income inequality has become a public concern in China because inequality in income, assets and public social services has expanded rapidly. General Secretary Xi Jinping, confronted with the problem of declines in investment efficiency and potential growth, is trying to create a "middle class" and thereby to convert the investment-led economy into a demand-led economy through "new urbanization". Although China has a large "middle class", it is characterized by a particular social consciousness in which few citizens define themselves as "middle class".

著者

赤津 正彦

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.47, no.4, pp.17-32, 2005-07-30 (Released:2017-08-30)

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After the Industrial Revolution, mid-19th century Britain experienced such serious air pollution due to the smoke generated by the combustion of coal used for industries that it required some form of social response. Scholars have argued that only humanitarian landlords pushed for the enactment of the Smoke Prohibition Bill of 1844, and that the Bill was thwarted by the general resistance of industrial capitalists, who believed in Laissez-faire ideals. This paper, however, will throw light on factory owners' participation in smoke regulation, and follow the process in which the Bill was rejected, not by the confrontation between landowners and industrialists, but by differences of factory owners' interests with regards to the regulation. In mid-19th century Britain air pollution was recognized in most manufacturing towns as something that damaged not only rich proprietors' real estate and properties, but also town laborers' health. Moreover, even many textile factory owners who caused the smoke nuisance were aware of the damage to their own business and properties. In response to such awareness, many landlords and humanitarian politicians, seeking relief for laborers, became promoters for nationwide smoke control. However, some industrialists in connection with the textile industry also played an important role in the promotion of smoke control. Moreover, smoke prevention technologies at that time, which not only could reduce smoke but also save fuel, enabled state interference that wouldn't go against the profit principle of manufacturers. And, the national importance of saving coal was also emphasized, as coal had been recognized as a limited and precious national wealth. Consequently, a strict smoke regulation bill drafted by a large cotton mill owner was presented to Parliament by a humanitarian landlord. The bill, however, was weakened by the disparity in financial strength between large and minor manufacturers, and was rejected due to the conflict of interest between textile factory owners and iron masters or collieries, for whom fuel saving, one of the grounds of the smoke prevention regulation, could not be easily implemented. Nationwide smoke regulation, therefore, suffered a setback due to the confrontation between industrialists. The disclosure of such problems, however, was important in that it made future Parliament turn to steadier measures, taking full consideration of the differences between industries and regions.

著者

西川 輝

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.58, no.3, pp.9-18, 2016-04-30 (Released:2018-04-30)

参考文献数

12

被引用文献数

1

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This article aims to shed light on the role of the IMF (the Fund) in the establishment of the Bretton Woods monetary system. Previous studies argued that it was the Marshall Plan and the EPU that facilitated Western European reconstruction, monetary stability and exchange liberalization, while regarding the Fund as having failed to resolve the serious dollar shortage in the same period and accordingly lapsing into dormancy.Contrary to the common view, however, primary sources show that the Fund’s Managing Director and leading staff members sought aggressively to intervene in the process of establishing an intra-European multilateral payment scheme. These efforts persisted even after the Marshall Plan and subsequent “ERP Decision” prohibited the Fund from providing finance to the Europeans. The Fund’s staff regarded the rise of the OEEC and the EPU as potentially undermining to the Fund’s prestige in the field of exchange liberalization.As early as 1950, therefore, the Fund began considering policies that would prompt its members to remove their exchange restrictions. Attributing the prevalence of exchange restrictions to a worldwide dollar shortage, the Fund’s staff pointed out the need for international policy coordination and stressed the importance of tighter macroeconomic policies aimed at stabilizing international balance of payments. The Fund's emphasis on the need for austerity measures rested on the so-called absorption approach that was being formulated at the time in the Fund’s Research Department. Furthermore, the reform of the financing system undertaken under the leadership of Managing Directors Mr. Gutt and Mr. Rooth enabled the Fund to intervene in the macroeconomic policy-making of its member nations through its financing role.Consultations on Article XIV began in March 1952, and the Fund began promoting its members’ monetary stability and exchange liberalization in accordance with its liberalization policies. Major Western European currencies returned to convertibility at the end of 1958, and in February 1961, the Fund’s European members transitioned to Article VIII status. It is evident that the Fund was impelled by the bitter experience of “dormancy” to extend its mandate from the relatively minor role of providing short-term finance to the dynamic one of implementing policy on monetary stability and exchange liberalization.

著者

林 采成

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.55, no.4, pp.1-15, 2013-07-30 (Released:2017-08-30)

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The purpose of this paper is to analyze the development of the railroad business as the core business of the South Manchuria Railway Co. (SMR) with a focus on the significance of SMR's efficiency and profitability. The SMR became part of the Japanese Empire's railway network after the 1904-05 Russo-Japanese War. It was founded on occupied railways and military railways of the Russo-Japanese War, so large-scale investments were made early on. Thereafter, many workers were dispatched to these facilities and additional investments were made. The fact that the SMR was less capital intensive than other railways signifies that labor-intensive railroad management and capital savings policies were implemented. The SMR was also characterized by a freight-centered transport structure under which freight transport saw steady increases by comparison with passenger transport. In particular, the SMR sought improvements in frequency of train operation, load efficiency, car allocation capabilities, and the concentration of transportation, in order to cope with the temporal and spatial fluctuations involved in freight transport. Demand for passenger transportation was secured through improvements in passenger-car quality and train operating speed. Needless to say, car usage efficiency rose as a result; improvements in efficiency were also made possible by decreasing the ratio of cars under repair. The SMR achieved extremely high levels of capital and labor productivity and a highly efficient railroad management system in comparison with other railways. This was accompanied by economies of scale, so that profit rates showed a long-term trend upwards from the SMR's founding until the end of the 1920s. After the state railways of Manchukuo and the Hamgeongbuk-do portion of the Korean National Railways were commissioned to the SMR after the 1931 Manchurian Incident, the SMR's productivity decreased abruptly and its profitability also deteriorated. The efficient management system that had been built up by the SMR was thereupon extended throughout Manchuria and efficiency improvements confirmed in the entire Manchurian railway network, including the state railways. During the war, new demand and supply adjustments were made to achieve improvements in efficiency. However, the substitution of land transport for marine transportation had a negative effect on efficiency and profitability. The SMR, which had been established in wartime and had prospered in peacetime, eventually reached its limits and collapsed under wartime conditions.

著者

鈴木 淳

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.57, no.3, pp.64-66, 2015

著者

永島 剛

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.58, no.1, pp.62-64, 2015-10-30 (Released:2017-10-30)

著者

鴋澤 歩

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.54, no.1, pp.70-72, 2011

著者

韓 載香

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.52, no.1, pp.1-18, 2009

参考文献数

61

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This paper examines the process through which credit unions were founded by the Korean-Japanese minority, placing particular emphasis on the political and economic conditions that prescribed and enabled their establishment within the historical setting of the North-South conflict. Organized activity by Korean-Japanese political organizations such as Choren, the Federation of Korean-Japanese People, was instrumental in creating the first credit union in the period of reconstruction after World War II. In the ambiguous situation arising while the legal status of the Korean-Japanese was yet to be defined and the establishment of credit unions was not yet certain, organized action by the Korean-Japanese was an important driving force behind joint establishment of credit unions for the elimination of discrimination. However, while the effect of political divisions did not appear immediately, the north-south conflict gradually penetrated the credit union, resulting in the purge of those with differing political opinions. To service those Korean-Japanese who were excluded from the first, a second credit union, the Shogin, was ultimately established by the business community associated with South Korea. Thus, political and economic factors were compounded in the background of this nationwide rollout of the two credit unions. The establishment process of Shogin was not necessarily smooth. One problem was the lack of knowledge regarding financial institutions in the South Korean-Japanese community; another was that despite the will to establish the Shogin, there were not the financial resources to do so. A further problem was that the financial authorities regarded all Korean-Japanese customers as South Korean citizens, which for legal reasons resulted in the lengthy delay in its establishment. In such conditions, the establishment of Shogin was ultimately accomplished with support from ethnic-political institutions such as Mindan, the Federation of Korean-Japanese People, and financing from the South Korean government, which committed to the establishment of the credit union as political conflict with the north sharpened. In the end many small credit unions emerged prefecture by prefecture since they were prescribed for political as well as economic reasons. These credit unions had limited operational scope as financial institutions from the beginning, due to their funding scale. Future growth thus relied on population size and the economic viability of the Korean-Japanese community in the area covered by each union.

著者

筒井 正夫

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.46, no.3, pp.10-19, 2004-04-30 (Released:2017-08-30)

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The purpose of this paper is to clarify how and when Kanazawa, a typical castle town of the Tokugawa Era, was transformed into a modern city. I conclude that Kanazawa accomplished the transition after the Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895), mainly in the first decade of the 20th century, for the following three reasons: First, after the Sino-Japanese War, the newly developing bourgeois class and shizoku (samurai class) with an interest in modern capitalism organized a chamber of commerce and its political detached corps, the Jitsugyokai. This group gained a majority in the Kanazawa city council, which previously had been occupied by old-type shizoku, and had occasionally been paralyzed by political conflict before the war. Through petitioning at the prefectural and national level, members of the Jitsugyokai achieved several important accomplishments, including the construction of social facilities and the revision of tax laws, according to their interests. They also launched an anti "business tax" movement in cooperation with merchants and industrialists throughout Japan, and through this movement they clearly recognized their own urban interests, as opposed to rural interests. Subsequently, they successfully implemented independent electoral districts for cities, which can be regarded as the political manifestation of the establishment of the modern city, supported primarily by merchants and industrialists. Second, through the active efforts of the city council and the chamber of commerce, modern institutions and facilities in political, industrial, educational, traffic and sanitary domains were created in Kanazawa City, establishing its status as a modern city. Third, civil associations such as fire brigades, which originated in the Tokugawa Era, had resisted coming under public control in the early Meiji Era, but were successfully reorganized under the new administration of Kanazawa City after the Sino-Japanese War.

著者

吉田 義明

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.55, no.4, pp.40-51, 2013-07-30 (Released:2017-08-30)

著者

前田 廉孝

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.57, no.1, pp.50-52, 2014-10-30 (Released:2017-08-30)

著者

マグヌッソン ラーシュ 石原 俊時

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.49, no.4, pp.53-62, 2007-07-30 (Released:2017-08-30)

著者

土地制度史学会 政治経済学・経済史学会史編纂委員会

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.2008, pp.8-97, 2008

著者

平山 勉

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.51, no.2, pp.1-17, 2009

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The purpose of this article is to clarify the actions of the South Manchuria Railways Company (SMR) and its shareholders during the period of the 1933 SMR stock issue, using documents from the closed institutional records of its Tokyo branch. My interest in this issue is to establish how the SMR achieved this capital increase from private sector shareholders and investors in general, given the turbulent business environment resulting from the Manchurian Incident and the resulting increased scrutiny of the SMR itself. At the same time, I consider the significance of changes in the shareholder body during the take-up period by examining the reorganization of the SMR. In summary, this article establishes the following four points. First, bids for the newly-issued common stock were distributed approximately into two groups, the majority of bids clustering around the 53 yen mark, below the lower price of the offering. The record of the public offering shows that while some general investors were enthusiastic during the "Manchuria boom," others demonstrated a rather more cool attitude. Second, after the new stock came into circulation, it was rural shareholders who took up new and outstanding stock sold off by urban shareholders in areas such as Tokyo, Osaka, Aichi, Kanagawa and Hyogo prefectures. The proportion of stock held by rural shareholders increased, and the number of shareholders also showed a greater rate of increase in rural areas than in urban. Throughout the take-up period, the relative importance of rural shareholders increased within the SMR shareholder body. Third, the sale of SMR stock by urban shareholders was triggered by political intervention in the SMR from the period of the Manchurian Incident to the time of the stock issue and the resulting management uncertainty and poor outlook. On the other hand, the reason that rural shareholders bought up the stock was that within the context of a widening loss of confidence in regional banks, an improved "environment for investment" brought about the stable circulation of reliable SMR stock which was seen as a haven for investment Finally, the transformed shareholder body successfully demanded the restructuring of the SMR to ensure the recovery of the share price and the payment of dividends Within the context of an increase of issued stock and diversification of the body of shareholders, the SMR could not ignore the specific demands of a large body of shareholders, numbering some tens of thousands of registered individuals, and as such it may be said that the shareholder body was able to exert a form of "governance" over the SMR.

著者

吉田 克己

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.57, no.1, pp.44-46, 2014-10-30 (Released:2017-08-30)

著者

村松 怜

出版者

政治経済学・経済史学会

雑誌

歴史と経済 (ISSN:13479660)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.61, no.2, pp.35-51, 2019

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<p>This article studies the Ministry of Finance's philosophy on income taxes in Meiji and Taisho Japan. The contribution of this article is twofold. First, it reexamines "tax reform as social policy" in Taisho Japan. Second, it reveals aspects of the Ministry's taxation philosophy that lasted until the postwar period. Previous research on Taisho‒era tax reforms has focused on the relationship between the tax reforms and "social policy." The tax reform of 1920, considered a major example of "tax reform as social policy," has received particular attention: its inclusion of dividends in taxable income in particular is attributed to the taxation and social policy theories of the Japan Association for Social Policy Studies.</p><p>In contrast with the previous studies, this work reveals other factors leading to the 1920 tax reform by following MOF discussions of income tax going back to the Meiji period. First, the general principle of taxing dividend income did not arise out of a "social policy" context but was consistent with the income tax system envisioned by the MOF since Meiji. The MOF consistently supported a general income tax levied on aggregate income as well as differentiation of the income tax such that earned income would be taxed more lightly than unearned (capital) income. Second, for the MOF, the emergence of the "social policy" debate simply represented a "good opportunity" to bring about the general taxation of dividend income. The chief of the MOF's National Tax Section of the Tax Bureau, KATSU Masanori, who played an important role in the 1920 income tax reform, regarded general taxation of dividend income as essential for a fair tax system. He took advantage of the "social policy" debate to propose the income tax reform. In the 1930s the MOF proposed the so‒called Baba Tax Reform Plan, which attempted a comprehensive general income taxation. The Tax Bureau, moreover, regarded the comprehensive system of income tax recommended by the Shoup Mission during the postwar US occupation of Japan as the "ideal" tax system. MOF consistently embraced this tax philosophy from Meiji into the postwar period.</p>